Stephen DeHolles
Stephen Jake DeHolles (born September 30, 1989) is an American singer-songwriter/guitarist who rose to fame as the vocalist/guitarist for Call It a Tragedy, and has, throughout Call It a Tragedy's hiatus era, received considerable attention as a solo artist, thanks to his solo debut album, DeHolles, released June 25, 2006. The follow up, A Toast to This, which proved equally successful, was released February 19, 2009. Career With Call It a Tragedy (1999-2006, 2010-present) Joining in 1999 as the singer-songwriter/guitarist, DeHolles was the youngest in the newly formed band Call It a Tragedy, not yet ten years old, while bassist Tyler Johnson and drummer Richard White were roughly a year older. The band released two studio albums, Call It What You Want (1999) and Twelve More Songs (2002) which only gave the band limited success. This limited success, however, paved the way for their major-label signing to Wreckway Records and the mainstream success of next two albums Hell Yeah (2004) and Hell Yeah: Part II (2005). However, it was this popularity and new, hectic life that resulted in internal problems for the band, as members, attempting to write the fifth album, argued over song ideas and spotlight issues. This ultimately resulted in the four year break-up of the band. In early 2010, however, DeHolles was called by bassist Johnson who said he and drummer White had made up and were both wondering if DeHolles wanted to be a part of the band again, and so the three got back together, and throughout the year, produced their 2011 fifth album, Hell Yeah: Part III, which proved to be their most successful yet. Solo career (2006-present) Around the time that Call It a Tragedy were arguing with each other, DeHolles realized that the band couldn't go on for much longer, and so gave up on writing music for the band's album and instead began writing music for a solo album. Sure enough, less than a month later, the band officially broke up in late May 2006 when White announced he was going to drum for Dirty Rats, an underground metal band, and in response Johnson said he missed his family and girlfriend too much to go on with the band, anyways. Prepared to enter the studio, DeHolles recorded his solo debut throughout the first two weeks of June 2006 and the lead single, "Just Don't Care Anymore" (allegedly about the band's break-up) was released the same day it was recorded and the album was just half-complete, June 7, 2006. The song debuted very high on the Hot 100, at #16 for the week ending June 14, 2006. The song reached its #14 peak a week later, and this song, initially often mistaken for being a Call It a Tragedy song, received a lot of airplay immediately after release and helped DeHolles' debut album, self-titled DeHolles, released June 25, 2006, to debut at #1 on the Billboard 200. The album eventually sold over 2,000,000 copies. The other hit off the album was, "Wasn't Listening", which peaked at #19 on the Billboard Hot 100, and was certified Platinum by the RIAA. This album allowed DeHolles to go on the DeHolles Tour which spanned half a year from September-March 2007. After this album's hype was over, DeHolles decided to take a relatively long break, from April 2007-October 2007, about six months. Towards the end of 2007 DeHolles began work on his follow up, but admitted in interviews throughout 2008 that he "wasn't really inspired" to write music at the moment, so the process "could take a little time". He did entered the studio in August 2008, and the album was complete by November 2008. The lead single, "A Toast to This", released the same month, proved to be a hit, peaking at #9 on the Billboard Hot 100 for two weeks, and was his most successful solo single, though it was arguably the only successful single from his follow up. The album, A Toast to This, was released a few months later, in February 2009. It debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200, and went on to sell over 1,500,000 copies in the US alone. With the confirmation that Call It a Tragedy were getting back together, DeHolles announced near the release of Call It a Tragedy's Hell Yeah: Part III release that he was through with solo work for a while, but just until the album is complete and the hype for it calms down. DeHolles was also featured in quite a few songs through his solo career, most signficantly the 2007 single "Hit the Club" with Dre Westin and the 2008 single "Time to Start Living", with Bullet$. Discography Solo *''DeHolles'' (2006) *''A Toast to This'' (2009) With Call It a Tragedy *''Call It What You Want'' (1999) *''Twelve More Songs'' (2002) *''Hell Yeah'' (2004) *''Hell Yeah: Part II'' (2005) *''Hell Yeah: Part III'' (2011)